Celebrate Lunar New Year 2024: A Guide to Chinese Culture and Essential Table Manners

This year, the Lunar New Year will fall on Saturday, February 10, 2024. This celebration has become dear to me since my son married a young lady from China. Huamin and her family have been such a blessing to our family! Learning about the Chinese culture has made me a more grateful person. In this blog post, I want to share some of the social expectations surrounding Chinese culture and how we can benefit from incorporating their etiquette into our lifestyles and table manners in America.

The Lunar New Year in China

In China, people will receive seven days off from work to celebrate the New Year. In 2024, this will be February 9th to February 15th. Offices, banks, factories, shops and most non-essential services will close doors for the week-long holiday. Of course, hotels and large outlet stores stay open…and may even be busier than usual! School holidays will last for four weeks and migrant workers are off during this time as well.

Dining Etiquette for Chinese Families

Here in the United States, we can grow as a culture if take time to learn and understand the norms of the Chinese culture. Let’s begin with a basic place setting for a typical Chinese meal. The place setting will feature the following…

• A small teacup
• A large plate with a small, empty rice bowl
• A set of chopsticks, usually on the right of the plate
• A soup spoon

In China, good manners invite luck and are an indication of good educational status and upbringing, while boorish conduct brings shame. Everyone is expected to arrive on time for dinner and food is served in small bites.

Chinese parents spend a great deal of time training their children as a whole and teach children how to eat with chopsticks at a young age. In addition, children are taught gratitude…even before they approach the dining table. Parents expect their children to eat the food they are given and to say “Thank You.”

Improve Your Table Manners with a Dining Etiquette Expert

Respect is a key element to remember when growing as a well-mannered person. Kindness towards those from cultures different to our own will enable us to advance our own skills and become people that others want to be around.

I encourage my students to increase their people skills by learning about the accepted norms for etiquette and table manners around the world. This type of social reciprocity makes for a happier life and will help in your friendships and business relationships as well!

Lisa Burdette is an experienced Dining Etiquette Expert in the Dallas area. She works with corporate companies to help employees learn how to handle themselves in the business environment. Lisa also trains families and individuals how to succeed at home, school and work.

Ready to book your private or group session? Or, want a custom etiquette plan for your company? Lisa loves to customize her classes to meet her client’s needs. Send a message via our Contact page to request your session with our etiquette expert today!

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